The band's attitude — cool, detached, derisive — came across in their classic records, which are almost as much about the look and feel as about the music itself. Bands searching for both style and substance have a lot to learn and be grateful for. "As long as musicians steer clear of pastiche, a little homage is a healthy thing," Reid says. "We used to talk about Psychocandy when we were making it, that people would be listening to it 20 years later."

Review: La Roux at the Paradise "I could have been singing this at the Grammys — but I'm here with you tonight," declared Elly Jackson, the public face of La Roux, with a detectable dash of annoyance folded into several dollops of playful sarcasm.

Not teens, not dreams “The abstract has been very good to us.” I am communicating via e-mail with the two members of Baltimore’s dreamy pop choir Beach House, and to be honest, I don’t know which one of them made that statement.

This bird can sing For any artist, there comes a time when you must assess just what it is you have to offer the world.

Powering up with the Smith Westerns Sometimes when we settle into the tattered sofa of lo-fi pop music, it's easy to imagine that the artists intended for it to be made this way.

Die Antwoord | Ten$ion Moreso than any "controversially-lipped" chanteuse (to borrow from one of Lana Del Rey's many observers), South African rap/rave/meme/satire/knuckleheads Die Antwoord beg the question:"Is that all there is?"

The Ting Tings just won’t go away The 2000s as a whole felt like a giant one-hit-wonder tar pit, but the decade also had a silver lining for young bands — television commercials.

Alabama Shakes | Boys & Girls In 2012, every other mainstream female pop singer is trying her hand at honest-to-God soul, shooting stylistically for Aretha Franklin (by way of Adele's 21) but usually winding up closer to early-Nelly Furtado.

THE MARY ONETTES | HIT THE WAVES | March 13, 2013 Hit the Waves is so heartfelt as a pastiche of '80s alternative music that it almost muscles its way into being brilliant.

THE MODERN RETRO OF JESSE DEE | March 05, 2013 On his new record On My Mind/In My Heart , the question is not if Jesse Dee can step up to the challenge of making authentic soul and R&B music in 2013, but rather how he goes about it.

TAME IMPALA’S NEW SURROUND SOUND | March 08, 2013 Whether it's Bradford Cox with Deerhunter, or Dan Snaith with Caribou, or Kevin Parker with Tame Impala, there must be something with this trend in sonic auteurs with cervine band names.